Atlantic Division Preview: Last Year’s – and Potentially This Year’s – NBA Champs

Welcome to the sixth of the Corner Three 2019-2020 NBA division-by-division season previews. In each of these previews, we use RJ Garcia’s player-by-player ratings (based on on/off metrics and career trajectory) and per-game minutes projections (taking into account potential minutes lost to injury) to project overall team quality for the upcoming season. RJ and Derek Reifer also provide their own analyses and commentary to provide any context and additional insights.

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Who, Why, and In How Long: Round 2 of the NBA Playoffs (East)

The first round hasn’t been made best-of-5 yet, so it played pretty much according to script. In the East, that is. The Warriors have dilly-dallied, and the Nuggets have had trouble closing out the Spurs.

With some help from my co-host RJ Garcia, we already broke down round 1. Now, things get a lot more interesting. The big 4 in the East finally clash, after months of well-deserved anticipation. How do we see things shaking out?

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Who, Why, and In How Long: Round 1 of the NBA Playoffs

After a long wait, it’s finally here, and we had to do a quick breakdown of each of the 1st round matchups. Arya vs. Daenerys could be a doozy, and Bran vs. Jaime has all kinds of history…

Oh yeah, the NBA Playoffs are here too. I guess I’ll break those down too, with some help from my co-host RJ Garcia.

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The Sixers Aren’t Superman, but their Kryptonite is Green

Boston and Philadelphia.

Perhaps the two most historic American cities; one with a football team named the Patriots and the other with a basketball team named after the year the Declaration of Independence was signed.  One who traded for Jayson Tatum, and one who traded for Markelle Fultz. The NBA’s two Atlantic Division (because I guess that’s technically a thing) rivals have had an interesting pair of seasons: the Celtics had championship aspirations from the start, and despite a disappointing, drama-filled run, they stayed put at the trade deadline; the Sixers have made multiple huge win-now moves and effectively capped off their long, arduous Process.

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What the Pelicans are Waiting For

To the dismay of many, but mostly Magic Johnson and LeBron James, Anthony Davis is still a New Orleans Pelican.

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One Buck – What’s Up With Milwaukee?

Giannis Antetokounmpo might be the best player in basketball.

Of course, he also might not be, but the fact that he might be tells you enough about his talent. The 23-year-old, 6’11” tall, 7′ wingspan, every-position nightmare from Athens has more than earned his nickname “The Greek Freak”. However, the name originates more through a combination of his raw physical measurables and his hard-to-pronounce surname than his actual skill, which has grown at an incredible rate. Just the 15th pick in the 2013 draft, Giannis has panned out to an extent perhaps unimagined by even the Bucks, and more quickly than the rest of the league would wish. Giannis ranks 3rd overall in CornerThree WAR and 2nd in RPM WAR across the entire NBA, and has an extremely versatile skillset that allows him to play all 5 positions on both offense and defense. Despite this, the Bucks sit just half a game above the 8th seed in the Eastern Conference, sport a -0.3 average point differential per game, and rank 19th out of 30 in TSP, which expects them to perform at a level under that of a 38 win team in the postseason. FiveThirtyEight ranks them as the 2nd-worst team in the postseason.

How?

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NBA Playoffs First Round Preview: Cleveland vs. Boston

Rivalry renewed? LeBron and the Celtics have had many a playoff run-in, including his last few games as a Cavalier (the first time). However, this time doesn’t feel quite the same, with Rondo, Allen, Pierce, and Garnett all gone. These new Celtics, though, are nothing to sneeze at, and will have a chip on their collective shoulder in an effort to spoil Cleveland’s renaissance season.

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